by Alexis Davie
“What the fuck are you doing?” she demanded. “Get off me!”
“Oh, come on, Madeline, you don’t have to play hard to get. We both know you want this,” Lee sneered.
“I most certainly don’t,” Madeline said.
She reached for the door handle, but Lee grabbed her wrist.
“How about just a quick blow job, then? You know, for my troubles bringing you home and all that.”
“You’re disgusting,” Madeline spat.
Lee’s face changed again. The anger was back and Madeline shrank back in her seat as he got right in her face.
“You know what, Madeline? You’re nothing but a stuck-up bitch. Leading guys on and then not putting out. Well, fuck you. I’m not your chauffeur. Get the fuck away from me,” he yelled.
Madeline reached for the door handle again, afraid this was a trick, but Lee made no move to stop her as she scrambled out of the car, clutching her purse. She was still reeling from Lee calling her a bitch. She wasn’t one of those. And she hadn’t led him on. At least not intentionally. Regardless, she didn’t owe him anything.
She stood in the street, her heart pounding as Lee pulled away so quickly his tires squealed. She stood watching his vanishing lights and tears began streaming down her face. She knew she’d had a lucky escape, but now what? She was a good hour’s walk from home and it was almost midnight.
She couldn’t call her father. There was no way she could explain this to him without ending up housebound for the rest of the summer. She thought of calling Ethan, but then she remembered the way he had refused to even speak to her that afternoon. That only left Charlie, and she didn’t want to come between her and Scott.
With a sigh, Madeline slipped her shoes off and, sniffling, she began the long walk home.
14
Ethan lay in bed, aware that Madeline still wasn’t home, and telling himself he didn’t care. His drinks with Cole had ended up being cut short when Cole announced he was off to a beach party. Ethan had declined to go, not wanting to spend another night flirting with girls he had no interest in. He was starting to wish he had gone now, though. It wasn’t like he could sleep until Madeline was home. No matter how much he told himself he didn’t care where she was or what happened to her, he very much did care, and the protective side of his wolf refused to let him rest while he didn’t know if she was safe or not.
At five past one, Ethan heard the front door open. Madeline was home. Maybe now he would be able to get some sleep. He listened to her coming up the stairs, pretending he wasn’t paying attention to her every move. He heard her going into her bedroom and closing the door. He closed his eyes, determined to sleep. He should have been ready for sleep after last night when he had managed less than an hour, but his senses were too alert, his wolf too aware of Madeline’s close proximity to him to allow him to sleep.
He could hear a weird snuffling noise coming through the wall from Madeline’s room and he sat up frowning, trying to work out what the noise was. It dawned on him that Madeline was crying. He forgot all of the promises he had made to himself about moving on and staying away from Madeline, and he was off the bed and stalking toward Madeline’s room in seconds.
He realized he was naked, and unlike last night, it didn’t seem the best way to be when he got to her room. He threw his jeans and a shirt on, leaving the shirt open. He went to Madeline’s room and knocked softly on the door. She didn’t answer, but he knew she was awake. He could still hear her crying.
“Madeline? It’s me. Can I come in?” he asked softly.
“Just go away,” she said.
He could hear the pain in her voice and he pushed the door open and slipped into the room. Madeline was lying on her side on the bed, her back to him. She was still wearing her dress, but her feet were bare, filthy, and cut. Ethan moved to the side of the bed and sat down on it. Madeline sat up, moving away from him and pulling her knees up to her chest.
“What happened, Madeline?” Ethan asked.
“Nothing,” she retorted.
She sniffed and wiped at her face, trying to get herself under control.
“Madeline, talk to me,” Ethan said. “Please.”
She looked him in the eye and he could see the pain there. It made his heart ache and he wanted nothing more than to pull her into his arms, but he resisted the urge. She studied him for a moment longer and then she shook her head.
“I was using Lee to try to get over you and it backfired. That’s it,” she said. “We went to a party up at the beach and I told him it was over between us.”
“What did he do? I know you, and if he had just yelled about it, you wouldn’t be crying. And what the hell happened to your feet?”
Madeline sighed, but it wasn’t an angry sigh, it was a resigned sigh, like she had decided to open up to him. Tears shone in her eyes as she told Ethan what had happened in Lee’s car.
Ethan could feel himself raging inside, especially when he heard what Lee had called her. How dare he speak to her like that? How the fuck dare he touch her when she had told him no?
“And my feet are my own fault for wearing shoes I can’t walk in comfortably. I took them off to walk home,” Madeline explained, trying to smile through her pain.
Ethan shook his head, unable to comprehend what she was telling him.
“So, let me get this straight. This creep tries to kiss you, yells at you, and then abandons you in the middle of the night on the roadside?”
“Pretty much, but honestly, there was no way I wanted to stay in the car with him at that point anyway,” Madeline said.
Ethan’s temper rose another notch and he could feel his wolf straining to get out. He knew with the level of anger in him, he wouldn’t be able to control his wolf for much longer. He had to get away, but he didn’t want Madeline to think he didn’t care. He thought of something which would solve both problems. He stood up abruptly.
“I’m going to the party to show this motherfucker what happens when you mess with my girl,” he snarled.
He turned and practically ran from the room. He could hear Madeline calling after him, but this was something he had to do whether she liked it or not. He grabbed his car keys from the table at the bottom of the stairs. He could hear Madeline behind him on the stairs, but he wasn’t going to let her talk him out of this one.
He got in his car and pulled away. He could see Madeline on the doorstep through his rear-view mirror, but he looked away. He couldn’t risk going back and her seeing who he really was, and he knew if he met her eye in the mirror for even a second longer, he would go back.
Ethan’s plan was simple. There was a patch of forest on the way out to the beach where he often went when he wanted the freedom of running as his wolf. He would go there, turn, and let off some steam, and then he would go and deal with Lee. As much as his wolf wanted to tear Lee apart, he couldn’t let that happen. He would deal with Lee, man to fucking coward. He didn’t need claws to tear strips off that fucker.
15
Madeline watched Ethan drive away, her stomach full of tension. He had looked so angry. She had almost lied to him and not told him what had really happened, but the truth had just poured out once she’d started talking. And now she feared that Ethan was going to go too far. She had never seen him so angry. She had to stop him.
“Sorry, Dad,” she whispered to herself as she took his car keys from the bowl and ran down the driveway to his car.
Ethan was long out of sight, but she knew where he was heading. She kicked herself for telling him where the party had been, but she knew if she hadn’t, he’d have found out anyway. She had seen Cole there, and it wouldn’t have taken long for Ethan to call around and find out if she’d been seen somewhere.
She drove along, breaking the speed limit and knowing she was dead if she got caught. She didn’t care. She just wanted to catch up with Ethan and try and talk some sense into him before he burst into the party and caused a huge scene. She was genuinely afraid of what he might d
o to Lee after seeing the way he had struggled to control himself when he found out what had happened, and she didn’t want to be the cause of that. She was sure she could calm him down, though, if she could just talk to him.
Once she left the built-up area of the city, she floored the accelerator, and the car sped along so fast that she could feel the steering wheel vibrating beneath her hands. She knew Ethan would be rushing to get out to the beach, but she was confident he wouldn’t be going this fast. He had no idea she was following him, so he wouldn’t be in as big a hurry as she was.
She spotted Ethan’s car up ahead. She slowed down, not wanting to draw attention to herself and have Ethan recognize her father’s car. She frowned as his turn signal came on and he pulled off the main road and into a barely used side road.
Oh God, had he contacted Lee and lured him out here so he could really hurt him?
She made the same turn, coasting slowly now, her lights off. She wanted to assess the situation before Ethan saw her. If he was here first, she could still talk some sense into him, but if Lee was already there when Ethan arrived, she might need to be more stealthy about her arrival.
She spotted Ethan’s car parked up ahead. No other cars were around and she relaxed ever so slightly. Lee wasn’t here yet. Her knuckles were white on the steering wheel, her hands aching, and she relaxed her grip a little.
She frowned when she saw Ethan getting out of his car. He was completely naked and her jaw dropped open. She didn’t think this moment could get any weirder, but then Ethan dropped down into a crouch and he was gone, replaced by a large, gray-and-black-colored wolf.
Madeline slammed on the brakes of the car, sure she had completely lost her mind. How had Ethan turned into a wolf? It just wasn’t possible. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes. She counted to five and then opened them again, but Ethan was still gone. The wolf was gone now as well. She saw a flash of gray to her right and she peered through the darkness in time to see the wolf’s tail vanishing into the woods.
She got out of her father’s car. A voice in her head was screaming at her to get back into her car and go home. What if the wolf came back and attacked her? She knew somehow that the wolf wouldn’t hurt her, though. It might be a wolf, but it was still Ethan, and Ethan would never hurt her.
She moved to Ethan’s car and peered in through the window. His keys were still in the ignition and his jeans and shirt sat on the passenger seat. It had been real. She wasn’t dreaming, and she wasn’t losing her mind.
And still, she wasn’t afraid. Somehow, seeing Ethan become a wolf hadn’t scared her. It had surprised her, of course, but she realized with interest that rather than this putting her off Ethan, it only made her want him more. She could a feel a stirring deep down inside of her that craved Ethan. She wanted to look into his yellow wolf eyes and run her hands through his pelt. She wanted him. All of him—the man and the beast.
The voice inside of her, the one telling her this was crazy and she should just go home, had fallen silent and all thoughts of Lee were gone from her head. All she could think about was how much she still wanted Ethan.
Madeline moved to the front of Ethan’s car. She hopped up onto the hood of the car and remained sitting there, waiting for him to come back and explain to her exactly what was going on here.
16
Ethan ran through the woods until he felt some of the anger beginning to fade. He was still angry—that bastard had hurt his girl—but he wasn’t raging mad to the point where he was afraid he might kill him.
He turned and began making his way back to his car. He stepped out of the trees and saw something that made his insides shrivel up. Madeline was sitting on the hood of his car. She turned her head in his direction and smiled.
That threw Ethan. She shouldn’t be smiling. She should be panicking, running away. But she wasn’t. And that’s when he knew. She must have seen him turning. She knew it was him, not just some random wild wolf. There was no way he was going to be able to lie his way out of this one, or give her any explanation other than the truth. She would think he was a monster and go back to hating him. He didn’t like the idea of that one bit; in fact, it broke his heart, but he could see no other options.
He strode across the field to the car and looked up at Madeline. She looked down at him. Still, she showed no fear, only curiosity. She extended her hand slowly. Ethan remained still, letting her come to him. She gently ran her hand over his head and down his back. She smiled to herself and then pulled her hand back.
“I don’t know if you can understand me when you’re like this, but you have some serious explaining to do,” she said.
Wasn’t that the truth? Ethan turned back into his human form. He stayed crouched low.
“Mind handing me my jeans?” he said, very much aware that he was naked.
Madeline laughed softly.
“It’s nothing I haven’t seen before,” she said, but she got down off the hood and went to the car.
She leaned in and pulled out Ethan’s jeans. She threw them to him and she even looked away as he pulled them on. He fastened them and then he stood looking at her. Her reaction was still throwing him for a loop.
“Okay. Why aren’t you freaking out?” he asked.
Madeline sat back down on the hood of the car. She lay back and looked up at the sky. Ethan joined her and they lay side by side.
“I don’t know,” Madeline said after enough of a pause that Ethan had begun to think she wasn’t going to answer him. “On a rational level, I know I should be running from you, screaming. And if you had sat me down and said, hey, I can turn into a wolf, you know, I would have done just that. But somehow, seeing you, I don’t know. I’m just not afraid of you.”
“Well, that’s something, I guess,” Ethan said. “How did you even know I’d be out here?”
“I didn’t. I followed you to stop you from going too far with Lee. I saw you turning off down this road. I thought you’d lured him out here to kill him or something.” She gave a half laugh and turned her head toward him. “You haven’t, have you?”
“No,” Ethan laughed, turning his head so he was looking into her eyes. “I’m usually very much in control of myself. I say when the wolf comes out and when it doesn’t. But when you told me what had happened, I was so angry. And when I’m angry, I can lose control. I came out here first to run some anger off, so when I saw Lee, I would just smack him around a bit rather than wolf out on him.”
“Lee doesn’t matter anymore,” Madeline said.
Ethan thought he would disagree, but as she said the words, he knew they were true. Somehow, Lee didn’t matter anymore.
“That’s how you knew about what he’d done after the party, wasn’t it? I thought you were just jealous, but you’d followed him in your wolf form, hadn’t you?”
“Not exactly,” Ethan said. “I just wanted to go for a run to clear my head. Because it was so late, I figured I’d be fine in town. It was just coincidence that I saw Lee’s car. It was obvious what he was doing.”
“Why did you need to clear your head?” Madeline asked, a teasing smile playing across her lips.
“I think you know why,” Ethan murmured.
“Yeah,” Madeline said. She moved her hand across the hood of the car and covered his with it. He felt sparks flood through his body. “Ethan, I can’t get you out of my head. And seeing you as a wolf only made me want you more.”
Ethan raised an eyebrow and she laughed.
“What? You were so strong, and graceful, and…”
Ethan didn’t hear what came next because he cut Madeline’s words off with a kiss. He moaned as their lips collided, and they rolled closer to each other, their hands all over each other’s bodies.
He had promised himself he wouldn’t do this, but how could he not do it? He was miserable without Madeline. And doing it one more time couldn’t make him feel any worse when he wasn’t with her.
He pushed himself up with one elbow and maneuvered Madeline on
to her back, not breaking their kiss. He lowered himself onto her and she writhed beneath him, moaning his name through their kiss. He moved his lips from hers, kissing down her neck. Pushing himself off the hood and landing on his feet, he dropped to his knees before Madeline could react.
He pushed her dress up and she lifted her ass, and he pulled her panties down before thrusting them into his jeans pocket. He moved his face between her thighs. He inhaled, smelling her sweetness. His wolf growled in approval as Ethan pushed his tongue against Madeline’s wet center. She moaned again as he began to work her, and she hooked one leg over his shoulder, opening herself up to him.
He licked back and forth and side to side, listening to Madeline’s breathing turn into a series of desperate-sounding, ragged gasps. She made a loud ahh sound and then she shouted his name. Her hands balled up into fists beside her body.
He gently moved her leg and stood up. She looked up at him, her eyes lust-filled as he leaned forward and grabbed her by the hips. He pulled her to the edge of the hood and she sat up, wrapping her arms around his waist and kissing him again.
Her fingers fumbled with his button and then it was open. She unfastened his zipper and pushed his jeans down. She wrapped her fist around his erection. He was already close to coming, and her touch almost sent him over the edge, but he held himself back.
His cock pulsed, sending waves of pleasure though his body. He knew he had to stop her before he exploded, but her touch felt so good. He pulled back from her lips and nibbled on her neck. She kept working him and he sucked in a breath through gritted teeth. She seemed to sense that if she pushed him any harder, this was going to be over, and she stopped moving her hand, releasing him. She put her hand on his shoulder and lifted herself, opening her legs to him.