ClaimMe (3 page)

“Who was she?” Jane asked in a quiet voice, her gaze still
locked with Jude’s.

He was instantly unsettled. Breaking their eye contact, he
turned away. Jane sprang to her feet, surprising everyone, including herself.
Jude looked at her over his shoulder, a curious expression on his chiseled
face.

To Drake, she said in a breathless voice, “Perhaps a little
less testosterone in the room would help ease the tension.”

He gave her a contemplative look, clearly not willing to
leave her alone with two shifters, even if they had imprinted on her.

“Drake.” Her tone was insistent.

“Fine.” He stalked toward the door, but said, “Call me if
you need me.”

“Of course.” She knew she wouldn’t. There was nothing Drake
could do to help her at this point.

Jude sat on another sofa facing her and said, in answer to
her earlier question, “I suppose it’d be moot to lie and say I don’t know what
you’re talking about.”

She nodded. “I’m pretty good at this. You can’t hide
anything from me. Especially now that you’ve imprinted on me. The gift is even
more powerful.”

“Some gift,” Cray muttered. “You’re close to tears.”

She tried to compose herself, but the pain was real and
palpable and…excruciating.

As she took a few steps toward Jude, he said, “Her name was
Celine. She was a member of my pack until a hunter attacked her. He left her to
suffer instead of finishing her off. She was injured too badly to self-heal. I
found her just before she passed. There was nothing I could do to save her. She
died in my arms.”

Jane sucked in a sharp breath as she felt the familiar stab
of pain in her chest that always accompanied memories of Sean. He’d been slain
too. She knew how devastating it was to lose a lover and her heartache doubled
as she experienced Jude’s torment along with her own.

She swayed again on her high heels, reeling from wave after
wave of dread, sorrow and angst washing over her. Cray moved behind her, gently
placing his hands on her biceps to stabilize her.

“Jane,” he whispered in a soothing tone. “Try to make it
stop.”

“I can’t,” she mumbled as tears filled her eyes and grief
consumed her. Not just hers, but Jude’s as well. She said to him, “You didn’t
imprint on Celine, but you loved her.”

“Very much. She wasn’t
the one
though.”

“How can I be?” she asked as fat drops rolled down her
cheeks. “For either of you? And
both
of you?”

“I don’t know,” Jude told her. “It’s not something I’ve ever
experienced before and I don’t know exactly how it works, except to say that
something within both of us connected with something deep within you.”

“Like soul mates.” She’d thought Sean had been hers, but
even with him, she’d never felt this magnetic pull so acutely.

“True mates,” Cray said from behind her. “Jude and I always
thought of it as a mysterious and unattainable wolf legend, because neither of
us had experienced it in our twenty-nine years.”

She turned to face him, finding that breaking the eye
contact with Jude helped to lessen the agony radiating throughout her body. She
stared up at Cray, allowing her soul to connect with his instead. Warmth flowed
through her, along with an intimate sensuality that helped to push out some of
the pain. The very essence of Cray was magical to her. He oozed sex appeal, no
doubt about it, but he also emitted a quiet strength. A gentle passion that was
the polar opposite of the fierce passion she sensed within Jude.

A molten sensation seeped through her veins and down her
spine as Cray’s large hands clasped her waist and their bodies gravitated
toward each other and naturally melded together. Jane’s fingers touched his
skin at the opening of his shirt, the tips trailing along his supple skin. His
muscles tensed in response to her light strokes.

He was so much like Sean, before he’d been turned. His skin
was hot and it felt heavenly against hers. He chased away the chill she’d felt
for longer than she could remember and his heat almost eclipsed her and Jude’s
pain. Enough that she could breathe a little easier and feel something other
than sheer agony.

She asked, “How did you know I was the one?” It was, as he’d
said earlier, an inevitability that could not be reversed. Acceptance was
really her only course of action.

“We caught your scent when we were up around Niagara Falls,”
he told her.

She blinked. “You could
smell
me all the way up
there?”

He grinned. It was an easy, comfortable, yet breathtaking
smile. She melted against him, her breasts pressing below the hard ledge of his
pectoral muscles. Her four-inch stilettos put her at a perfect height, allowing
their bodies to conform to each other.

“It’s a very enticing bouquet,” he mused in a low,
erotically stirring tone. “You’re not the first vampire we’ve encountered, but
you’re definitely the first one who smells like lilacs in the spring.”

Jane laughed, Cray’s lighthearted nature overriding some of
her inner turmoil. “My favorite fragrance. I always wear it.”

“It drew us here,” he told her as his head dipped and he
sniffed the skin at her neck.

“You knew I was watching you when I was upstairs in Drake’s
office. How?”

“I sensed it.”

“You imprinted on me through a security camera. Without even
ever seeing me.”

“Jane,” he said on a sigh. “Stop analyzing and dissecting
it. Stop trying to make sense of this. The universe’s rules and general common
sense don’t apply to imprinting. It’s innate. It’s primal. It’s mystical.
That’s what makes it so pure and so special.”

“But you both imprinted on me.” As difficult as it was to
break the intimate contact with Cray, she turned in his arms again to face
Jude. “You’re the alpha, right?”

He nodded. “Cray’s my second.”

“An alpha who shares?”

His jaw tightened for a brief moment. Then he said, “What
choice do I have in the matter? Neither of us can help what happened. It’s
innate. It’s primal. It’s mystical. Just as Cray said.”

She stepped out of Cray’s loose embrace and crossed back to
where Jude sat. He reached for her hand and pulled her to him, into the V
created by his long legs—she was a magnet and he was steel. She sank to her
knees and rested her forearms on his powerful thighs as she gazed up at him.

“I’m sorry I’m hurting you with my past,” he told her in an
edgy tone.

“There’s nothing you can do about it. But maybe…” She
glanced back at Cray before returning her attention to Jude. “Maybe the reason
you both imprinted on me is because the balance is necessary. Cray reminds me
of someone I once loved. That memory is painful unto itself, but your agony
adds to it. Cray’s good nature softens the blow a bit. But regardless of the
pleasure or the pain, there’s no denying we’re all bound together now. I can
feel it deep in my soul.”

He nodded as though he understood. But he said, “This won’t
be easy. In fact, it’s very…complicated.”

She could feel the tension running rampant through him. It
was a raw intensity that was visible in the hard set of his jaw, his squared
shoulders, his bunched muscles. But mostly, she saw it in those eyes that
looked like melted dark chocolate.

“My entire existence has been complicated since I became a vampire,”
she told him. “Par for the course and all that.”

For the first time since she’d met him, he smiled. The flash
of pearly white teeth and the slight lessening of some of his internal
consternation made the gesture not only a relief but the final welcomed
acceptance of their unusual connection.

She had the compelling need to release him from his
torment—as much as possible at any rate. She wondered if she could transfer
some of Cray’s carefree disposition to Jude. It wasn’t something she’d ever
tried or considered before, but perhaps she had the power to pass sensations
onto him, now that they were all so intricately and viscerally joined.

Leaning toward him, she brushed her lips over his. They were
warm and soft, like Cray’s skin, providing that human touch she’d wanted so
much to experience again. A wicked thrill shimmied down her spine. She traced
the tip of her tongue over the smooth flesh at his mouth and Cray let out a
groan behind her.

Yes, this was definitely complicated. Tricky, in fact.
Kissing one made the other jealous.

Jane tried to placate both of them with a flippant, “Trust
me, there’s plenty of me to go around.”

“There’s hardly anything to you at all,” Jude said as his
large hands circled her biceps and he pulled her closer to him before he kissed
her passionately, his tongue sweeping inside her mouth to tangle with hers.

It was a hot, demanding kiss. One that seared her to the
core of her being and sparked deep, dark desires.

She shifted while still kissing him and straddled his lap,
her short skirt hitching up a few notches. Her arms wrapped around his neck and
his encircled her waist. She pressed her upper body to his and felt all of the
rigid muscles against her soft curves.

The need to ease his woes rose within her once more and she
deepened the kiss, boldly thrusting her tongue into his mouth and taking over
the kiss. Only for a short while, of course. Alpha that he was, he took back
the control, which thrilled Jane again. The push and pull was sinfully
delicious and it superseded myriad negative emotions evoked by being so close
to him.

When they finally came up for air, Jane was lightheaded and
ridiculously turned-on. She felt less of a strain on Jude’s soul too, which was
encouraging. She’d succeeded in passing on some of Cray’s carefree attitude.

She climbed off Jude’s lap and returned to Cray. She deftly
unbuttoned his shirt and splayed her hands over his bare chest. She let out a
sigh of genuine appreciation.

“I guess if a girl has to be involuntarily imprinted upon,
she couldn’t ask for two hotter imprinters.”

Cray grinned. “Nice to see you’ve finally come around.”

“Like Jude said, what choice do
I
have? Besides…” She
shoved the material over his wide shoulders and down his heavily muscled arms.
“I never would have moved on from Sean if you hadn’t come for me.” Shooting a
quick look back at Jude, she added, “And maybe I can help you get over Celine.”

He seemed to work down a lump of emotion lodged in his
throat, but then he nodded.

She returned her attention to Cray. “You’ve never had a
broken heart.”

“No ma’am.”

“I’ll be very careful not to change that.”

His lips grazed her temple as he said, “You don’t have to
tiptoe around us. We’re more than aware of the difficult situation we’ve
created. We both suspected the outcome before we agreed to come here for you.
In theory, one of us should have stood down, but in reality… That’s not
possible when you feel like this. So we have to make it work.”

“The three of us?” she murmured as his warm lips swept over
her skin, across her cheekbone, then down to her mouth, where he nibbled one
corner.

He whispered, “It might be kind of hot.”

A soft laugh escaped her parted lips. “I don’t think there’s
any question.”

He groaned again, the sound low and sexy. It reverberated
deep within her. “Good thing you’re not human.”

She thought of the multiple ways in which these two men
might pleasure her and, for the first time, didn’t miss being human.
“Definitely
do not
let my size fool you. Or deter you in any way.”

“We’ll keep that in mind,” he said in his sensuous voice.
Then he kissed her. Tenderly and certainly with a different sort of intensity
than Jude exuded. But it was no less explosive.

Jane’s inner walls squeezed tight, making her desperate to
feel Cray’s cock inside her. Jude’s too. She craved them both.

Cray held her tightly, their bodies melding together again.
Her fingers twisted in his tousled hair, the strands silky against her skin.
She longed to feel her bare breasts against his chest and was relieved she
didn’t have to break the kiss to tell him as much. He must have wanted the same
thing, because he reached for the zipper at the middle of her back and slid it
partially down the track. He peeled away the bodice of the dress and then
gathered her close to him again.

Her hard nipples pressed to his hot flesh and Jane tore her
mouth from his, despite her previous reluctance to do so, and gulped down a
hearty breath of air. The skin-on-skin contact was nothing short of
electrifying.

“Oh Christ.” Her chest heaved and she tingled from head to
toe.

Behind her, she heard Jude stand and whip off his suit
jacket. Then he joined Jane and Cray and unzipped her dress the rest of the
way. He worked the tight material over her hips and down her legs.

Excitement shot through her. Desire prickled her clit. Anticipation
created a throbbing sensation so intense in her pussy, it seemed to pulse
throughout her entire body.

Jude stripped his shirt off and pressed his chest to her
back, instantly enveloping her in male heat and human suppleness. The very
things she’d longed for and had convinced herself she’d never feel again.
Cray’s hands gripped her hips and Jude’s palmed her breasts, massaging the
small mounds almost roughly. It drove her wild.

Cray’s head bent to hers again and he kissed her, the
gentle, teasing strokes of his tongue a direct contrast to the way Jude pinched
and rolled her nipples with an assertive touch. Jude’s mouth grazed her craned
neck and he nipped at her flesh, making her nearly jump out of her skin.

She felt another powerful jolt when Cray’s hands moved down
to her ass, sliding between her backside and Jude’s front. He squeezed the
cheeks and crushed her to him. Not to be outdone, Jude wedged a hand between
her and Cray and two fingers stroked her labia through her thong panties. And
then he targeted her clit and Jane was hopelessly lost.