Ride the Wicked Woodsman (A Night Falls Alpha Werebear Shapeshifter Romance) (8 page)

She extended her claws all the way out. They were impressive, but it didn't mean she was alpha. Pretty much all adult shifters could maintain the claws and fangs. It was the hulking beast that walked on two legs and could bench press a tank that worried me.

Landa took a swipe at my face. I pulled back at the last second, my heart rate accelerating.

"Hey!" Clover yelled and tried to shove the blonde away before she could attack again.

Landa took a swipe at Clover, her catlike speed helping her nick the young woman in the throat. The males had remained quiet spectators as she had tried to nail me, but now they were restless in their chairs as she drew blood from the vice-president's baby sister.

One of them stood up and started toward us, warning Landa to back down.

She was too far into a hissing rage to listen. She feinted another slash at Clover before changing directions at the last minute and aiming for my eyes.

I dodged it, grabbed her arm with one hand, ducked as she tried to get me with her free arm. Twisting to her side, I took hold of her arm again with both hands and started to turn in a hard, fast circle, the velocity of my swing lifting her off her feet.

Letting her go as I had her airborne, I watched her slam into one of the solid concrete pillars that supported the building's roof.

Landa hit the floor, her body motionless and twisted in ways that were unnatural -- even for a cat shifter. Trying to move, she groaned, then screamed as she forced her spine straight with gut wrenching cracks.

I had thought my pulse was running out of control when she started the fight, but seeing the puma looking broken on the ground, my heart beat so fast I thought it would burn out or explode any second.

Had I crippled her?

I looked at the column and saw the force of impact had cracked it vertically. Not all the way through, only a spidery line that ran around eight inches, but cracked nonetheless.

How had I done that? How had I matched her speed and thrown her with such force?

While I stared at the shifter on the floor, Clover clutching my arm and whispering "oh shit" over and over, one of the men ran into the meeting room. Taron came out first, followed by Braeden and half a dozen Woodsmen.

Taron looked from me to the woman on the floor, his gaze darkening.

"She totally attacked us," Clover blurted, tilting her head to show him the fast healing wound and bloody smears on her neck. "Onyx didn't say a single word to that bitch, she just came out all fucking pissed from the meeting room and started talking smack then attacked us!"

"Is this true?" Taron asked me.

I nodded as Clover started to have her own meltdown.

"Do I ever fucking lie?"

"No, little wolf," Taron relented. "Lying requires you to think before you speak and that's not your style."

He looked down at Braeden who had rolled Landa onto her side and had his hand pressed solidly against the center of her back as she moaned and writhed.

"Are you healing that bitch after she attacked me?" Clover asked.

Green eyes that matched her own glared up and stopped the flow of her indignant protests.

"Let Mallory finish her," Taron said, grabbing me by the elbow. "Take your sister home."

He nodded at the other males who had been in the meeting room with him.

"Church is over."

********************

Hands wrapped tightly around Taron's waist, I waited for him to shut the bike off and lower the kick stand before I slid off the back. The drive down the mountain in daylight had been sufficiently terrifying. The trip up in the dark -- my nerves frayed by the fight at the club meeting -- was merciless.

"We'll go to the city tomorrow, get you a riding jacket," he said as I hugged my arms against the cold that gripped me. "And whatever else you need."

"I need my car," I sniped then clamped my mouth shut before exposing my reason.

The longer I stayed, the more I would ruin his life. That whole scene at the clubhouse wouldn't have happened if I wasn't there.

He was too proud and protective to back down from the unconventional claim he had made. It might already be too late to save his position as pack leader, but if I stayed much longer, he might find himself outcast, as well.

I mean, she was a fucking shifter and I had hurt her so bad with so little effort that she couldn't recover quickly and had to have an alpha help her.

"None of that nonsense about needing your car so you can leave," he growled. "At least not tonight. I've had enough people arguing with me for the day."

Mute, I followed after him and stood to the side as he slatted the door once we were in the cabin. Seeing me stand there like an idiot, he nodded at the kitchen.

"You didn't have time to eat at the meeting. You should fix yourself something."

I shrugged. At that moment, I didn't feel like I would ever eat again. He had healed the pain in my stomach, but my gut was still twisted in knots with everything that I faced. I was packless -- couldn't go back to mine, couldn't stick around Night Falls and make Taron an outcast with me.

Shoulders sagging, he shook his head. "Suit yourself. I'm taking a shower."

I wanted to reach out, to touch him as some tender of an apology I couldn't force into words. But I couldn't risk contact, not as fragile as I felt. It had been far too long since I'd had a comforting hug and I would surely break if he gave me one.

"I'll start a fire," I offered in reconciliation. He'd already showered that morning, was only doing so again because he was pissed and didn't want to be around me even though I had only been defending myself and Clover.

"Suit yourself," he answered curtly.

I watched him disappear into the bathroom then sat on the rocker, my face buried in my hands. The shower started up, the faucets turned on one by one. As preoccupied as I was by what had transpired with Landa, I still groaned as a picture formed in my mind of his naked body beneath all that water pounding at his flesh.

There had been good looking males in my father's pack, an even better looking human male on the street where we lived, but none of them compared to Taron. There wasn't an unkind angle to view him from. He was gorgeous and sexy under any light.

His energy was amazing, too.

I had felt it on the ride there and back, my arms around him for safety. I had been in the presence of other alphas, including other pack leaders and the leaders of both of Champaign's prides, but they possessed nothing like the glow of power and warmth he exuded.

The Woodsmen would be worse off if they ejected him as president, no matter who replaced him.

That was another reason I had to go. There would be those -- people like Braeden and Clover -- who would support Taron as pack leader. I had to think about what would happen to them within the pack if Taron was voted out.

I had to go, with or without my car.

The water cut off suddenly. I jumped up from the chair and hurried toward the fireplace as I tried to measure how much time I'd just lost agonizing about my situation. I could have sworn it was just a few minutes, less than a handful.

The bathroom door banged open, Taron emerging wet and clothed only with a towel around his thick waist. He was marching straight at me, eyes blazing just as Landa's had done.

I scrabbled backward, tripped over the corner of the fireplace and tumbled toward the floor. He caught me, scooped me up and walked me over to his bed, where he dumped me before returning to the fireplace with a harsh growl.

He threw a log in, struck angrily at a match then glared at me over his shoulder.

"I thought you would take longer...that I'd have more time to start it."

Turning away, he finished building the fire. His shoulders shook as he worked and the reason for all the hate his eyes were throwing at me finally slammed into my chest.

He had realized his mistake in claiming me, maybe even in protecting me in the first place. Now he was furious.

Sitting up, I wrapped my arms around my legs and buried my face against my knees.

"Stop it," he rasped, sneaking up on me and tugging at my arms until I let my hands fall limp against the mattress.

When I continued to hide my gaze from him, he jerked my legs straight, tipped me onto my back and draped his big body over mine.

"Give me your hand," he ordered.

I did, surprise filling me when he interlaced his fingers through mine.

Damn, why did it have to feel so good being touched by him, even when it was just my hand in his?

"You keep wanting to run," he accused. "There's barely been a minute today I couldn't smell it on you. Even when I'm surrounded by water your desire to escape sneaks into the room and fills my snout."

He shifted his weight, forcing my legs to part so his could fill the space between them. His grip on my hand tightened for a second then relaxed. "You're not going anywhere without me until you can transform. You showed an alpha's strength tossing her like a rag doll without shifting. When you can actually shift, you won't need my protection."

A harsh laugh escaped me. "If you're going to wait until I can shift to cut me loose, I'm pretty sure that means you're stuck with me forever. You might want to reconsider your terms for my departure."

I wasn't going to lend any credence to his alpha remark by telling him how very wrong he was on that point. One couldn't be an alpha without shifting and holding the middle state. I could do neither.

"Not happening," he answered, his free hand coming up to brush some of the hair from my face.

Meeting his gaze, I tried not to think about how our bodies were molding together or how good he smelled with the day's cares freshly washed from his skin.

Closing his eyes, he pressed his forehead against mine and held it there as he spoke.

"I'm not your family, Onyx. I'm not going to fail you and I sure as fuck am not going to abandon you. I'm not even going to let you drive me away until I know you'll be safe without me."

Chewing at my lip, I started to squirm beneath him, his vow sinking into my skin like razors. I wanted him to mean what he was saying, to believe that at that moment he actually did. But everyone eventually failed me, even those who had once claimed to love me.

And if he was true to his word -- I would be his ruin.

So I had to get away and he wasn't going to entertain the idea until I could shift.

I squeezed his hand. "How are you going to help me shift?"

Taron rolled to one side and settled on his back. "Straddle me."

I coughed, shock rattling around inside my chest. Had he just ordered me to mount him?

He rolled his eyes then offered up a snort. "Don't be a prude. We're both dressed."

I plucked at his towel, my bottom lip jutting out to one side in contradiction of his claim.

"Close enough," he laughed. "Just give it a try. You can stop if it gets uncomfortable."

Beautiful, dumb male -- it already was uncomfortable!

Huffing my doubt and reservations, I climbed onto Taron, my weight settling mostly on my knees so that I hovered over his groin without putting any pressure on him. His hands wrapped around my hips and pulled me down, then remained there so that I couldn't readily lift up.

"Put your palms on my chest."

We were way, way past my comfort level but I obeyed.

"Close your eyes."

"Come on, bear, I'm not that stupid!"

His gold-brown gaze danced with mischief for a second before sobering. "Just go with it. You'll know when it's time for you to open your eyes. Until then, keeping them closed will help you feel what I want you to feel."

Hoping that unnamed thing he wanted me to feel wasn't the cock growing hard against my mound, I obeyed him and closed my eyes.

"Open your mind," he softly suggested. "I want you to feel with every last pore of your skin."

I wiggled against him, my clothes suddenly feeling like they were filled with fire ants.

"Shh," he whispered, his hands leaving my hips to rub against my arms. He touched my shoulders. "Feel it here, first."

His heat penetrated my body, the sensation concentrated where his fingers touched me. The warmth turned to tingling as he ran his hands back down to where my palms rested against his broad chest.

"Now here." He lifted them, kept them captured gently with his own then spread his arms out, the maneuver forcing my torso down so that my breasts pressed against him.

A breath quivered past my lips, but I kept my eyes closed. A smile played at my mouth as I remembered the old records my grandmother had played.

Marvin Gaye, Midnight Love, Track 2 -- (Sexual) Healing

Would it really make things worse if I let this happen one time, if I let the big bear I had my legs wrapped around seduce me? I relaxed into the idea, my body melting against his, holding him and held by him yet floating.

That's when I opened my eyes and saw my hand.

"What the fuck!" I screamed and rolled off the bed, my left hand shifting back to human form just in time to keep me from slamming hard onto the wooden floor.

Propping himself up on an elbow, Taron stared down at me, a satisfied smile on his face.

"I figure your body has been driving out the rest of the human DNA from the transfusion over the last few months. It explains what happened in the hotel, your coming into heat, the way the scent of your estrus has changed since just last night, and how you walloped the shit out of Landa."

"I didn't mean to hurt her like that," I said, my hands rubbing against one another in disbelief then smoothing over my arms and down my legs to make sure there wasn't some other part of me that had shifted without shifting back.

"The healing sessions helped speed it along," he continued. "But your mind has forgotten how to manage the transformation. That's why I was pushing my alpha at yours."

"Uh-huh," I said, only half listening as I finished inventorying my limbs and making sure they were normal.

"Wait, what did you say? My alpha?"

"What did you think I meant this morning when I said most of the males in my pack wouldn't be able to handle you once you were fully healed?"