Ride the Wicked Woodsman (A Night Falls Alpha Werebear Shapeshifter Romance) (9 page)

I stared at him, first in dumb disbelief then with a sort of vague hazy appreciation of the fact that his towel had fallen open.

"Dude! Put that thing away!" I jerked a hand up to shield my eyes, knowing deep down I'd never summon the willpower to close them.

"You put it away," he teased, tossing the towel at me so that it knocked my hand to the side. "This is how I sleep. With a guest or without."

"Then get under the damn quilt!"

Chuckling, he ignored my strident demand and rolled onto his back. He folded his hands behind his neck and stared at the ceiling, his entire body on display for my appreciation.

Damn...damn...damn...

He was fine as hell.

And I didn't know the first thing I was supposed to do with a naked, willing man.

But I knew I wanted to learn.

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

Taking the towel into the bathroom and hanging it to dry, I tried to process the fact that Taron was offering himself to me.

The only thing I knew for certain was that I was swimming in deep water. The Woodsmen didn't seem to have any kind of formal courtship approved -- if not arranged -- by the pack leader. Sure, some of the wolves in my father's pack had random hookups, but neither part had a claim to the other and such liaisons never occurred during estrus. Mating and official bonding were very political.

Here? Not so much.

I returned to the side of the bed, standing with one hip against the footboard. He had graciously closed his eyes so I could study his perfect form as much as I wanted. There was a lot to look at. He had maintained his erection, the thick shaft nesting against golden brown hair and the fat crown covering his navel.

Releasing a hot puff of air, I took a few steps forward then braced a knee on the mattress, leaving one foot firmly planted on the ground because I was not yet ready to commit to his proposition. I wasn't even sure what his proposition was. Was he looking for a hook-up or what passed for a social contract around these parts?

His back arched just the slightest, the rippled muscles of his abdomen pushing up at his cock while the skin on the shaft seemed to contract and lift it even higher.

More daring than I could imagine myself ever being, I molded my palm and fingers along the shaft but couldn't cover it.

"My pack leader--"

"Your father," he corrected, eyes still closed.

"Yeah, but he stopped being that a long time ago." A smart ass smile frosted my lips for a second as I remembered all the hell I would catch from my parents by referring to them, even in private family settings, as Pack Leader and Mrs. Pack Leader.

"Anyway, I wasn't allowed to interact with humans after the accident without an adult shifter with me."

"They thought you might go over to the other side and betray your own species?"

"Yes." I glanced up to his face to see his eyes were still closed. I kind of liked this way of communicating -- him naked and his gaze masked so I couldn't see him judging me even as I judged him.

I ran a nail lightly along the inside of his thigh and watched him vibrate.

Yeah -- I could definitely get used to something like this.

Provided it was with someone like Taron, even if I didn't have him figured out yet.

"That meant no Internet without adults monitoring me, either," I continued, my fingers tracing the grid of stomach muscles.

His eyes opened for the first time since I'd left the bathroom.

"Are you trying to tell me you've never seen a man naked, not even a picture?"

"Not like this," I explained. "Just what might flash on screen for a few seconds in an R rated movie."

One golden brown brow lifted incredulously. "Were there no single male shifters in your pack?"

"There were plenty," I answered, my hand retreating to my side. "Just not any who were willing to risk getting cooties from a former she-wolf who had never come into heat."

Uncomfortable discussing my defect, I started to take a side-step away from the bed but he caught my wrist.

"You don't want to walk away, Onyx. Be honest with yourself on that."

I met his gaze. The irises had melted to a dark honey color. Sliding onto the bed, I straddled him as I had earlier and placed my palms against the warm, lightly furred skin of his chest.

"If we do something tonight, what does that mean?"

He smiled, his lips bending in a way that was both amused and contemplative.

"Hopefully it means we both have a very pleasurable time."

"Granted." I laughed, but I couldn't find the humor -- not when I didn't know how much or how little was at stake.

"But I don't understand this 'claiming' business." My hands moved down to his stomach and the protrusion of his cock from where I straddled him. I let my thumbs play over the tip and watched his expression turn hot and epileptic. "You said I can leave Night Falls, but you announced to your pack that I am yours."

Taron captured my hands and drew them up to his chest, holding them gently so I couldn't tease his flesh.

"Bears aren't pack animals," he started. "We eat diplomats and politicians for dinner..."

"So, basically, you're not very popular as pack alpha?'" This time my laugh was genuine. For someone with an aversion for diplomacy, he was using a lot of words to get to his point.

"Among a sufficiently large minority, yes."

I bobbed my head, my teeth busy worrying the inside of my bottom lip for a few seconds.

"Did they call for a no confidence vote?"

He nodded.

"Right before Landa turned psycho-cat on me?"

"Yeah," he answered, gaze dropping for a second.

I ignored the very real possibility he was lying about what had set her off.

"But you're still pack leader and president of the Woodsmen, right?"

Another nod.

"But not if the she-wolf you stood up for runs off." I wasn't asking, and I knew by the grim line that flattened his mouth that my statement was true.

"The pack would suffer if it had someone like Mallory or Joshua running it," I said, freeing my hands from his grip. I leaned over him, my elbows propped on the mattress and my breasts lightly pushing at his chest.

"The storm will pass," he said, his hands curling around my hips to lock against the small of my back. "When it does, you can leave -- if that's what you want. In the meantime, you'll have my protection and that of the pack."

Letting my body sink against his, I tangled my fingers in his thick hair and pressed my face against his neck. He had answered my questions, even the ones I hadn't directly asked. This was a hook-up, a pleasurable way to pass the time while all the trouble I'd innocently stirred up settled. And I'd have a safe haven to figure out what I was going to do next.

"Just one last problem," I said. "I don't know what to do with a naked man."

I giggled. The thought would strike me later that night that more than a decade had passed since the sound had last bubbled up from me, but at that moment, I giggled and it felt amazing.

"Neither do I," he quipped, quickly reversing our positions with an expert flip that had me on my back and trapped beneath him. "But I know exactly what to do with a naked woman."

I released a slow, nervous breath as he grabbed my shirt's hem and began to ease the fabric up over my stomach. Catching me slowly gnawing through my bottom lip, he stopped and slid off to the side to lay next to me.

His finger stroked at my lip until I ceased chewing. Then he coaxed me to roll far enough that I faced him. His hand landed lightly on my hip and slid up under the shirt. He scooted a little closer, his hand maneuvering so that his palm was against my back and his thumb rubbed soothingly along my spine.

Taron's touch had a drugging effect -- from that very first point of contact and growing stronger each time his flesh met mine. My lids grew heavy. For a few irrational seconds, I thought I might be just as satisfied if I merely napped in the circle of his arms, snuggled up against the soft matting of hair that covered his chest.

"You're not using some form of alpha energy rohypnol on me, are you?" I half-teased.

He cinched me closer, his gaze dancing as he poked me back. "I don't think a she-wolf broadcasting pheromones for a good mile or more gets to ask that question."

I blushed, innocent but guilty as charged. I forced myself to let out the air I kept holding hostage in my lungs, my body shaking as my breath escaped.

Something flashed across his face and he pulled away. I caught him before he could open any real distance between us, my nails all but embedding in the skin and muscle of his thick bicep.

"I want this, even if I'm also on the verge of freaking out."

I let go of his arm before I drew blood. I rubbed at my cheek, patted it rhythmically in an attempt to calm down.

"Why don't we try this." He caught my hand, drew it toward him and kissed my palm. "You let me undress you."

I started a nod but he stopped me with a warning look.

"I'm going to be touching you quite intimately when I take your clothes off, Onyx."

"Okay," I answered, a little less eager to agree as fresh fear washed through me. I trusted that Taron wouldn't hurt me, not intentionally and not in any way physically that my body wouldn't recover. But walled up most of my life, I really was a babe in the woods.

For a shifter, any wounds that would remain from our joining were those that scarred the heart.

"You're going to get nervous--"

A barking laugh erupted past my lips. I slapped my hand over my mouth to stifle it. Slowly I pulled the hand away, uncertain whether another one was waiting to break free.

"You think?" I jabbed.

"You'll want me to go slow at times or pause for a breather."

He expected me to breathe during this? That was going to be a problem because I kept sucking air in and forgetting to let it out.

"Yeah," I agreed and slowly exhaled.

"When you say 'slow' or 'not yet,' I'll slow down or otherwise ease off, same if you say 'no.'"

I felt my eyes go wide at the implication.

No didn't mean no...

"When you really want me to stop, you're going to say something else."

I waited for him to tell me what that something else was. When he just lifted his brows and said nothing, it dawned on me.

"A safe word?" I choked out. Groaning, I twisted enough that I could bury my face in the pillow. I was either going to bust a rib laughing or pass out from nerves.

When I felt relatively certain I could contain myself from performing either act, I snuck a peek at him with one eye then turned my face back into the pillow as I asked him a question.

"You're not tying me up, are you?"

"Mumble, mumble, what?" he asked, and gave a light poke to the side of my ribs. At his touch, I instinctively jumped to the far side of the bed like a spooked cat.

He dragged me back and held me tight so I couldn't even hide.

"I heard my parents negotiating when that
Shades
book was all the rage." I grimaced, my stomach suddenly churning at the idea of my parents having sex -- especially THAT kind of sex.

"Baby," he growled and nuzzled my ear. "I don't need to tie women up to drive them out of their mind. And no blindfolds because I
will
be looking in your eyes when I make you come."

"Honeycomb!" I blurted, the brush of his stubbly chin against my neck and his hot breath erasing my newest bout of temerity.

Taron pulled away, studied my face for a second then broke into a wide grin. Pulling me into a sitting position, he quickly stripped my top off, leaving the bra in place. Then he pushed me onto my back, his grin growing even wider as he pushed my legs apart and settled into the valley between them.

"Prepare yourself she-wolf." He thumbed open the button on my jeans then slowly drew the zipper down, his eyelids moving in long, sweeping blinks before he nailed me with his molten gaze.

"I'm about to show you the true meaning of honeycomb."

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

Taron teased my jeans down an inch. He slid against me, his massive chest pushing at my mound as he kissed a slow sucking line from hip to hip.

Another inch lower and he exposed the pure black of my pubic hair. He stopped again, a low growl vibrating through his lips as he inhaled my scent, his nose and mouth stroking at the thick silk.

"I thought I was going to go mad last night smelling you like this."

I mashed my lips together to keep silent. The time for questioning him was over -- even if I couldn't keep my head from coming up with new things I wanted to ask.

"You're not thinking again, are you, baby?"

"Sorry," I confessed.

He chuckled then used his pressed lips to tug at my hair. "If you're thinking, then I'm doing this wrong."

He looked up as he spoke, the golden gaze challenging me to agree with him. I shook my head. Taron was doing everything right. The tremble infecting my limbs and torso should have told him so.

"I can do better," he promised, sliding lower and peeling the jeans all the way down to the top bend of my thigh.

Seeing my mound fully exposed, he licked his lips.

"I'm thinking this no panty situation should become law."

I laughed. It had felt weird going commando all day, especially knowing I was in heat and wanting to do everything I could to muffle the smell -- even if the pheromones emanated from every pore on my body.

"That would make skirts awkward," I joked nervously as his questing nose seemed determined to burrow until he found the split in my lower lips.

Gold eyes glanced up, the brows practically knitting together in a question mark. He lifted his head for a second as if he were going to say something then shook it and dropped his mouth to the line he'd just been tracing.

His tongue parted my labia and traced a slow path along its length.

My fingers clawed at the bedding beneath me until I had fistfuls of the quilt clutched in my gnarled hands.

Yeah, no questions, no answers, no talking at all, just this sweet sucking that had my back arching and my eyes rolling up.

Taron bunched the crotch and back of my jeans in one big hand, pinning me in position while the fingers of his free hand splayed my lips open. He dipped two fingers inside me, the tips emerging with a thick covering of a sticky, translucent liquid.

I watched, mesmerized, as the fingers disappeared into his mouth then emerged clean.

"This," he growled, "is the only honeycomb I want, baby."

The muscles of my chest wrapped tight around my rib cage. It wasn't just the words or the way they rumbled past his lips, but the hot promise in his eyes.

Could this work -- beyond him taking my virginity and offering me a few weeks or months of safe harbor filled with nights like this?

His molten gaze told me it could.

"Please," I whispered, straining against the grip he had on my jeans that kept me locked down on the mattress.

Lifting up and onto his haunches, Taron quickly stripped my pants away. But when he settled against me once more, his head was level with mine, not even his thick fingers between my legs to tease me.

"Kiss me," he commanded.

I lifted my head, uncertain of the mechanics. A peck wouldn't do, but I couldn't practically devour his face as my hunger urged.

I pressed my lips to his, found them closed and unyielding.

Squirming with frustration, I sucked his bottom lip into my mouth and chewed lightly at it as my hips pushed upward.

His mouth softened, just a little. I dared a push of my tongue, then a lick against his top lip when he refused to submit. But he moaned at that lick, offered his own and then our tongues were sliding against one another.

With my legs free, I pressed my knees against his hips, my mound butting insistently against the thick shaft. He let his weight drive my ass down to the bed, his cock wedging my labia apart as he slicked up and down my clit and took control of the kiss.

Strong hands curled around my head, held me immobile as Taron's tongue probed deeper. I trembled, threw my arms around his shoulders and squeezed as if that would stop the shaking.

He slipped free, kissed his way down my neck and began to nuzzle just below my ear. No longer holding my head, his hands freed my breasts from the bra and began to squeeze at the fleshy mounds, his fingers and thumbs plucking at the nipples as he laved my neck.

Our hips never stopped moving, the friction of cock against clit over and over making me wet and tender and wild.

Small vocalizations accompanied the soft spray of kisses he left as his mouth moved down my neck and across my collarbone before settling on one thick, pouting nipple.

Huffs, rumbling growls, grunts. He licked, sucked then took the aching tip of my breast between his teeth and rolled it.

I threw my head back, howling out my need and frustration.

"Soon, baby," he promised and pulled back onto his haunches, his fine ass resting against his heels. Big hands forced my thighs wide open so he could stare at all my swollen, dancing need.

"Pink like salmon," he teased, his long tongue salaciously unrolling from his mouth for a second before he quickly pulled it back in.

Holy fuck, I wanted that tongue on me, in me.

"Please," I whimpered.

"Please, what?"

His alpha voice kicked in, its lower vibrations sending the nerve endings along my breasts and pussy into a full meltdown.

"I want your mouth on me...your tongue..."

The rest of the words wouldn't come as a fever seized my brain.

Taron shifted forward as if he was going to pull my nipple into his hot mouth.

"Lower," I rasped, the look in his eyes telling me he had known with that first whimper I wanted him teasing my clit again.

"This," he said and tortured me with a slow stroke of his finger along the line of my pussy.

My hips shot up in answer. I pulled a handful of quilt towards my mouth because I couldn't unclench my fist and then I bit at the knuckles, moaning and grinding out my need against the air.

"You," he murmured, his big hands pushing my ass back down to rest against the mattress, "are truly a sight to behold."

I didn't know, had no reference beyond the disgusted looks the males in my pack had thrown my way. But with Taron's gaze scorching every inch of my flesh, I could truly believe I was beautiful, if only to him.

At least until estrus ended.

A growl sliced through that last thought.

"Baby, whatever just flashed through that pretty little head of yours deserves a lashing."

Before I could finish processing the threat and register fear, he pressed his chest flat against the mattress and lowered his mouth to my mound.

"Lucky for you, all I have in me is a tongue lashing when you're this hot and aching."

I blinked, my lashes flinging the needy tears that had accumulated at their tips. Letting go of the quilt, I knotted my fingers in Taron's hair and tugged him closer to my flesh.

"That's it, love, show me what you want -- what you need," he murmured. "I'm the only one who can give it to you. You're mine now."

His, yes. I could pretend tonight that he meant forever and that his will to make it so would obliterate all the obstacles between us.

I pulled at his hair until his mouth made contact with my mound, the lips instantly sealing around my clit. He sucked, pulled, throttled the swollen bud at the end until I had to release my hold and muffle my screams.

Each time I felt ready to cross some unknown but very tangible line within me, some barrier I had never explored beyond, he jerked me back with a new sensation.

His tongue curled under the hood of my clit to torment and bully the small pearl tucked inside. He pushed, circled, spooned at it until my body vibrated along the bed. Then his mouth abandoned me and I unleashed another indignant howl.

"Cruel," I whined, tears in my eyes from the need to cross that line, smash that barrier.

"Truly?" he asked, gaze amused as he slid two fat fingers inside my pussy.

All the bones and muscles in my neck turned to water. I couldn't keep my head up to glare my admonishment at him, could only let it loll back and watch the ceiling swim above me.

"You have to stretch wider to fit me, she-wolf," he warned just before inserting another finger.

"I will," I promised and squirmed around his fingers. All those dirty little kisses he had left along my clit had kickstarted hard clutching contractions deep within my pussy. My muscles wrapped around the thick, locked invasion of his fingers, sucked at their textured skin, tried to pull them deeper into me.

Tilting my hips, I reached down and spread my legs wider.

He had started huffing again, the sound mixed with long rolling growls, his top lip dancing with a barely suppressed snarl of need.

"Hungry, bear?" I asked, the look on his face and the tension coiling in his torso giving me the confidence to tease him back.

His fingers still in me, he flung his mouth against my clit once more, the lips taking possession but not before I heard his threat.

"Oh, baby, you're going to pay for that."

Three fingers wedged hard and fat hammered at my novice pussy. Teeth scraped along my labia before the sweet salve of his tongue whispered over the tenderized flesh. All of me contracted around him, my eyes squeezed so tight I couldn't see the barrier until it exploded around me, its shrapnel sinking deep to wake nerve endings I didn't know existed.

Panting, moaning, my eyes awash with mindless tears, I came hard for Taron.