Protect and Fur [3xtasy Lake 5] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (4 page)

She couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up as she clenched his shoulders and squeezed his cock tightly as he lifted her off of him. She dropped down on him hard, entranced with the look of bliss that would wash over Craig’s face with each stroke. She wanted him to look her in the eyes and see her wolf, but he averted his face to lick and suck on her breasts.
Next time their wolves could see each other.

Craig reached between them and circled her clit with his thumb, driving her closer and closer to the edge. She circled her hips and fucked him in a figure-eight pattern, which felt like she was dancing on his lap. The incredible pleasure grew until she howled out her release to the treetops. Craig grunted and jerked up against her as he came, moaning long against her sweat-dampened skin. She stroked her hand along his shoulders, petting him as they recovered. Despite the languor that infused her muscles, she couldn’t shake the cold feeling that he hid his wolf from her.
Whoever heard of Mates hiding their animals from each other?

When he didn’t make eye contact with her as they dressed, that cold feeling expanded until it wrapped around her heart. Her emotions cooled to Antarctic temperatures, and inside her wolf snarled at her stupidity. She did it again. Disgust welled up inside her.
I haven’t learned a thing, have I
?

“Hey, thanks, Craig. I needed that.” She kept her tone light as she lifted off him to pick up her clothes. He snapped his gaze up to her as he rose to his feet.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Thanks for the good time?” She shrugged. “I don’t know about you, but I feel much better.” That lie burned the back of her throat, and her wolf snarled in her head.

He leaned down over her, crowding her like she would expect from any pissed-off Alpha.

“But we both have different ideas of what happened here, don’t we?”

Yeah, I want forever and you don’t
. She tried to step back from him, but he wouldn’t let her get any farther than an inch.

“You don’t know me well enough to know how I think.”

“I know more than you realize, Brenna.”

He couldn’t. There’s no way.
Brenna mentally shook her head slightly. He was bluffing. “Then you know why I don’t want this.”

“Now you’re lying to yourself.” He jerked her back against him, and his marble erection pressed into her lower stomach.
How is he hard again already?

“You want this as much as I do, and trust me, I wish I could kick Aiden’s ass for what he did to you.”

“Let go of me.” Brenna’s stomach rolled dangerously hearing that name, and she shoved against him. Bile burned the back of her throat, and she swallowed nervously. How many others knew of her humiliation? He let her go this time, and she staggered closer to the water, taking in deep gulps of the clean air, and fought the urge to vomit all that whiskey back up.

She felt Craig grab her elbow, but she jerked her arms out of his grip. “Fuck. Sorry, Brenna. I shouldn’t have put it that way.”

“I haven’t exactly candy-coated anything I’ve said to you, so don’t worry about it.” She couldn’t turn around, didn’t want to look into a gaze filled with pity because she was so pathetic. “If I dish it out, I should be able to take it.”

“No, you didn’t deserve to be told like that. I should’ve been honest from the beginning.”

An icy finger danced a line down her spine. “From the beginning?”

“I knew about you two before I was transferred here. Aiden O’Reilly asked me to keep an eye on you.”

Craig wouldn’t be lecturing her about domestic violence later, because she was going to kill him this time. “You’ve known the truth for almost a year?” Her voice gradually got louder as she spoke.

Shame washed over her. She tried so hard to make sure that no one knew of her behavior and of the consequences. She’d acted like a naïve girl and was treated like a whore. “How much do you know?”

“Everything.” He stood his ground, looking down at her closely, watching her reaction.
Well, he isn’t going to see anything to run and tell Aiden about.

She’d fucked a man she thought would be her Mate, and he had walked away from her because she wasn’t good enough for him. She fucked Craig, and he hid his wolf from her. “Don’t you dare say anything to
anyone
.”

“It’s no one’s business but ours.”

That caught her off guard. “It has nothing to do with you, Officer Walker.”

“And we’re back to the denial game, I see.” Craig stepped back and picked his hat off the chair where he dropped it.

Every step he took away from her felt like she was being pulled toward him. She wanted to run into his arms and cry out everything that happened today. Unload the guilt from her inability to save Alec and fucking up the fun time they were having. Craig never looked at her the way she looked at herself, and she might’ve ruined that forever.

She would get out of this with a small shred of dignity. Holding her head high, she straightened her top and walked past him. She didn’t make a second step past him when she felt him rush up behind her. A large hand wrapped around her upper arms and pulled her around to see him. “Brenna, there was more to the situation than you realize. You both misunderstood what was going on.”

She’d deliberately poked at an Alpha’s pride, and now he was pissed. She expected to see the wolf behind his gaze, but Craig kept that part of his personality far away from her. He had to know they were meant to be Mates, too, unless that wasn’t what he wanted, either. Craig put his hat on, and she felt herself react to his uniform. She always loved the look of a man dressed like this. Add Craig’s cop voice and her wolf panted and her pussy throbbed. “You can’t outrun the past, Brenna. It has a habit of catching up when you least expect it.”

Months of bitterness swelled up and threatened to make her cry, dousing any remaining heat in her body. “I know what I need to know. If it was all a big misunderstanding, then where has he been for the last ten months? I don’t want one Mate, let alone two. I don’t need you. I don’t need him, so stay away from now on.”

She yanked her arm out of his grip, spun on her heel, and marched off down the path to her car.
Your Mates don’t want you because you’re not good enough for them.
Forgoing her vehicle, she stripped, shifted into wolf form, and raced into the forest, trying to outrun her shattered dreams.

* * * *

Craig watched Brenna storm away from him and fought the urge to run after her and beg. He knew that he didn’t deserve her, but he wanted her so badly. She was a gorgeous woman and she knew it. That kind of confidence never bothered him. It was the defeat he saw in her eyes when he brought up Aiden. She was carrying around a mound of scar tissue on her heart thanks to his best friend, and now him.
I never should’ve touched her.

That darkness inside him pushed for action, for freedom, but Craig couldn’t allow it. One slip is all it would take and he could hurt—or worse, kill—those he cared about, like his father before him. He plunked himself down on the chair she’d vacated and pulled his hat back off. He played with the whiskey as he looked over the lake, searching. He had come so close to losing control as she rode his cock. He hated the idea of ever hurting her, but it would’ve been worse if he let his wolf have even a moment of freedom.

Several swimmers were arcing through the water, and a boat moved slowly along beside them. Must be people training for the upcoming race this summer, as they were wearing wetsuits from what he could see. Although the water was still very cold, it was starting to warm up a bit.

He sat there watching the swimmers until they moved out of sight, and then continued to sit watching the sun start to drop behind the trees. How could he explain it to her that he had nothing to offer her? She was a beautiful creature, in both human and wolf form. And he spent most of his life trying to hide what he was. He kept control over his wolf because he knew what might happen if he didn’t.

He was used to rejection and expected the same from her, but didn’t expect it to drive a pain so deep into his chest. His mother didn’t want to have anything to do with him when she learned that he had inherited his father’s ability. Not that he blamed her completely. His father was a self-centered bastard who preferred his four-legged persona to his human one. Only the animal inside his father was as twisted as the human and developed a taste for fear.

Craig hardly remembered what his father looked like. When he thought of him he saw that mangy wolf with its patchy fur and yellowed eyes. Alcoholism was a debilitating disease, and its harsh effects on the body reflected the wolf his father would become. When he started attacking those who would help him, the pack’s Guardians declared him rogue and ended his life. It took years to reach that end, and by then the damage was done.

His human mother never allowed another wolf in the house and refused to join the pack in any events. She moved them to the city and when he showed signs of shifting as a teenager, she sent him to live with a distant uncle. He ended up spending all his time alone until he met Aiden.

Aiden was an angry kid and wanted nothing more than to train and grow up to be Guardian. Craig didn’t want anything to do with his wolven heritage. Both of them bonded over the need to be nothing like their fathers. Looking back now, he could see that they were rebelling in one of the worst ways, and if someone had forced them to sit down and examine their motives at the time, then they might be very different men now.

But would they have ended up here? At this time? Craig loved his job with the Ontario Provincial Police. He had the opportunity to protect people, and that’s all he wanted. Then Aiden called and said he’d met his Mate, but couldn’t watch out for her and needed Craig’s help. The weirdest part was a position in this district that opened up the next day, and no one applied for it but him. Since moving here he’d heard stories about how people ended up in Ecstasy Lake when the time was right, and he wondered if there wasn’t some truth to that after all.

He could still taste Brenna’s unique flavor on his tongue, and it was like ambrosia to his senses. The woman was his Mate, no doubt about it. She’d already crawled under his skin and yanked at the bonds he kept his wolf in. She might be his Mate, but he couldn’t allow her to do that. He wouldn’t turn his back on his family in preference to a life in fur.

The delicious scent of French fries, cheese, and gravy surrounded the double-decker bus sitting parked by the water’s edge. Brenna sat under a tree nearby tree enjoying the summer day as she ate her lunch and people watched. Double-Decker Fries had opened a few weeks before and was an obvious hit with the tourists. Max Shay did a beautiful job refinishing the bus to its former glory. He must’ve spent a fortune setting it up the way he had. The bonus was it gave everyone a new place to eat, and no one was more thankful than Catherine. The Shack was always busy, being one of the few local places to get something to eat, and Catherine had confessed to Brenna that she was relieved Max had opened it up. It helped take some of the weight off of her shoulders, and she no longer felt pressured to upgrade her menu.

Max’s food was really good, and he didn’t try to cut into local business. He and the ice-cream shop, across the road, had worked out some cross promotions. While the customers’ burgers were being made they could go up and get a milkshake to go with it for a discount. Max then reimbursed the shop half the cost of the discount.

Double Decker Fries wasn’t the only new business in town. There seemed to be a bit of a surge in the population this year. Brenna’s dad had told her about the three brothers who’d purchased the property and planned to open a microbrewery. Vencel Solfalvi and Colwyn Marshall were the ones who had designed and built the new building a few kilometers away.

When she’d asked if the McNamara brothers were human, her dad had shrugged as if he didn’t care, but she’d known his nonchalance had been feigned. After the Hungarian wolves from Vencel and Gaspar’s old pack had shown up last summer and tried to hurt Mai Solfalvi, her father had decided to take a closer look at the residents and visitors.

Brenna watched the Solfalvis head up for something to eat. Both Vencel and Gaspar wore a Snugglie on their chest. Each man rested one hand on the child he carried, and they each held their wife’s hand with the other. Mai had given birth a couple weeks before to twins, a beautiful baby boy they named Logan and a girl they named Emily. Catherine was a trained midwife and had been there to help the babies’ entrance into the world. Brenna had stopped in a few times to visit Mai and the babies to see if she could do anything to help out.

This was the first time she’d seen them out and about. Mai’s men were overprotective of their family, and that didn’t seem to bother Mai at all. If anyone hovered over her like that she would kick their ass.
Okay, maybe I wouldn’t.

For a brief moment in time she’d thought she’d found her future, one that would include babies and a family of her own. Her heart pinched in memory, followed by a wave of anger. Her appetite dissipated, and she dropped her burger on the wrapper and closed her eyes, thinking about that day. What Craig had said yesterday had thrown her for a loop, and she didn’t know what to think anymore.
If Aiden sent Craig to keep an eye on me, he couldn’t be that indifferent?
Right, and that’s why I’ve heard so much from him since then.
She opened her eyes again. Dreaming was for those who had a future. She wasn’t certain what hers was anymore.